


The best laid schemes...

by pulangaraw



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Character Study, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-21
Updated: 2013-09-21
Packaged: 2017-12-27 04:43:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/974480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pulangaraw/pseuds/pulangaraw
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Peter always has a plan.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The best laid schemes...

Now, Peter thinks. Now it starts. 

Peter has a plan. It’s a good plan, a solid plan. A plan that accounts for all variables and possibilities. He’s spent a long time on this plan, he’s turned it over and over in his head, looking at it from all angles, from different points of view and it’s a good plan. 

Now is the time to set his plan in motion. 

He’s been grooming Derek for the past three years, getting the kid to trust him, to look up to him. He’s been on his best behaviour in front of Talia and the rest of the pack. He’s doing what they want him to do, what they expect him to do, what his place in a family - a pack - as big and powerful as theirs demands from him. He grits his teeth and bites back the sharp words, hides the anger and the aggression deep inside himself. Not yet. Now is not the time. He needs to be stronger. 

When Derek falls head over heels for Paige, Peter sees his opening. When Deucalion and his friends come into town it’s like a gift from heaven. All he has to do is set the pieces in motion. 

He whispers in Derek’s ear, suggestions of love and power and forever and the naive boy believes him. Trusts him. He sends Ennis because Ennis is the one who won’t ask too many questions. 

Peter follows them and watches from the shadows, but he doesn’t interfere. That’s not part of the plan. Derek has to do it. Derek has to be the one to kill her. He needs Derek to break his own soul. 

He does send Talia to find him when he knows the deed is done. 

He knows this part of his plan was successful when he can feel the subtle shift of dynamic within the pack. It takes a few weeks to manifest itself, to settle and become permanent, but it’s there and it’s exactly what he hoped for.

Derek is no longer being groomed to take over the pack. He’s withdrawing into himself, keeping away from as much of the pack business as he can. Just as Peter had hoped, Talia’s focus has shifted onto her oldest daughter, Laura. Laura who still has golden eyes. Laura who isn’t heartbroken, isn’t a killer, who will never be as strong as Derek was going to be. Laura, who can be beaten, can be killed if the beta who challenges her is trained well enough and determined. 

\------------

Peter’s plan does not account for Kate. She turns out to be one of those unforeseeable things he could not have made room for. 

He does feel - in part - responsible for what happens, because after Derek is no longer a threat, Peter stops paying attention to him for a while. He focuses instead on learning as much as he can about other forms of magic that could aid him in his schemes. He has to keep his studies secret, hiding the books and only traveling to ask sources when he can make a plausible excuse to Talia and the pack. 

That’s why he misses Kate. He misses the hints when Derek’s demeanour becomes even more secretive and withdrawn in the weeks leading up to the fire. In retrospect he can see the changes, can almost pinpoint the moment when she slipped into Derek’s life. 

The fire brings all his careful planning to a stop. For a long time he wishes he’d died with the rest of them. It’s only when Jennifer finds a way to awaken his body, his wolf, that he feels a flicker of hope again. 

He’d planned on taking over a strong pack, a well established territory, but all of that is gone now. He has to adjust his plans. The territory is still there, nobody would dare claim it in the next fifty years or so. Superstitions and traditions run deep within the magical communities. Laura has become the alpha, he knows it, but she is far away for the moment. That’s good, Peter thinks, he needs more time to heal, time to plan.

It’s only the three of them now. Peter can appreciate the irony. When he is ready, he arranges to have Laura come back to Beacon Hills. He kills her, just as he’d always planned. Somehow, it feels anticlimactic. 

On his way back, he bites a teenager. He doesn’t think much about it, too caught up in the adrenaline of the fight. Later, he remembers he thought he might as well make a start at fortifying his strength now. Derek is going to be back sooner rather than later and he won’t take to the change easily. 

For a long while he thinks he made a grave error that night. That thought is mostly due to the fact that biting Scott brings his friends, who turn out much more potent than Peter would like. 

His biggest problems are Stiles and Lydia. Another one of those things he couldn’t have seen coming. There is nothing he can do about Stiles, the boy is too well protected to be destroyed easily. It would cost more than it’s worth to get rid of him. Peter will just have to be careful, work around the boy, try and play the long game. Maybe he can be won over eventually. Stranger things have happened. 

Somehow, Derek manages to pull all the support onto his side. Peter has worked on this for decades, he’s made plans and plans on top of other plans. He’s adjusted everything so he can fit his revenge on the Argents into his scheme to take over the Hale pack and this is what he gets as his reward. Everyone flocks around Derek. 

Derek, who’s been broken for so long. Derek who knows nothing, who Peter took out of the equation so many years ago, who messed everything up in the first place. He now rises from the ashes and stands over him, taking back what Peter took away from him when he was still a boy. Again, the irony is not lost on Peter. 

But he wouldn’t be Peter if he didn’t have a backup plan in place. 

Lydia was easy to ensnare, to manipulate into the role he wants for her. She’s not as well protected as Stiles and her unique powers make her the perfect anchor when things go wrong. She becomes his tether, his lifeline, and Peter has never been more grateful for all the years he’s spent researching magic. 

It’s what keeps him alive, when Scott and his friends manage to get the better of him. When Derek stands over him and rips his throat out. Peter lets go of the power he has been craving for so long.

“I’ll be back,” he wants to say, but doesn’t. He smiles as Derek’s claws rake through his throat. 

\-------------

The magic works, he comes back again, a third life granted to him. He takes it as a sign. This time he’ll be even better, even smarter. This time, he won’t make mistakes. 

He becomes the Peter from before, from the time when he thought up his very first plan to become alpha. He sticks to the background, hangs around the edges of whatever is going on with Derek. Derek has done him the favour of expanding the pack, but then makes one mistake after the other and loses them all again. 

It makes Peter want to step in, to stop this stupidity, but he holds back. He gives only as much as he has to, to ensure that Derek remains alive. After all, he doesn’t need the betas. He can create his own pack once he’s alpha again. It’s a waste, but so was losing all of his family to the fire. 

When he sees the first glimmer of red in Scott’s eyes, he feels a peculiar flash of pride. He made this. This is his work. And he feels like finally his patience is being rewarded. His path becomes clear.

After that it’s almost too easy. The druid plays right into his hand. He feels a pang of regret for poisoning Cora. She had been his favourite so long ago and seeing her alive and returned to him had been a moment of pure, untempered joy, but there is no time for sentimentality. He’s been waiting for too long. There’s too much at stake. And after all, if all goes according to plan, she’ll survive. 

For once, everything works out as Peter wishes it. Derek and Cora are leaving, he can feel them moving further and further away, but he’s not worried. They’ll be back. They’re his pack, they won’t last long without him. 

The druid sees it, right at the end, she understands and that’s why she has to die. For a moment Peter had hoped he’d be able to pull her over to his side, to use her for himself, but he can see it in her eyes. She’d never work for him. She’d never let him take what is rightfully his. She has to go. 

He slashes at her and the words tear themselves out of his throat. 

“I am the alpha,” he roars, “I have always been the alpha!”


End file.
